The firefighters forgot to close off the road when the Smelt house burned. Drivers slowed to watch flames tongue through blown-out windows. In the yard, Mrs. Smelt settled down in the grass, her coat spread beneath her. It had always been so cold in the house, she thought, and it was so nice to wear a single layer. As she watched, the house dropped beams and glass.
Cargo
November 18, 2007On the right side of the United Express plane with tail number N650RW, the flag is backward, stars toward the front of the plane, bars stretching tailward. It makes me uncomfortable not to know the logic behind this, whether or not it was an accident when the decal was applied. After all, if they can’t get the flag on in the right direction, how can I trust them to apply the correct pressure to the bolts, put the right amount of air in the tires, calibrate properly the instruments that guide the plane as it carries our daughter between us?
Documented
November 16, 2007“You get those tickets yet?” His voice sounded sandpapery as he spoke into his cellphone. “You even know what tickets look like?”
He looked out across the airport restaurant, his body shaped as if his weight had spent its lifetime giving in to gravity, and slouched further down in the seat. He could no more make himself small than he could hide the fact that he was staring at cleavage a table away.
“It was a joke,” he growled. “Goodbye.”
His burger arrived, and he began with the fries, eating as if no one was documenting this.
Protest
November 14, 2007Normally, I am willing to lose my identity. But that day, as the crowd swarmed, I wanted a nametag and a sign to carry. I wanted to stop in a salon along the route and ask them to streak my hair purple.
Too many of us wore black. Too many of us knew the same chants. It left me powerless to raise my voice, knowing it would only be part of a solid block of noise.
Against the grain
November 12, 2007We saved the bathwater, but not the baby. We went to the doctor when we got sick, even though we ate plenty of apples. We put beauty before age. We ended badly, but all was well, nonetheless.
Option/effort
November 10, 2007The rain fell so hard I drove the road from memory, picturing each curve and hoping no car came alongside to show where the actual diverged from the image in my head. I was driving to the gymnast’s house, and I had not told my boyfriend. The funny thing, I thought as I struggled to hold the road, was that neither of them was worth this sort of effort.
Currency
November 8, 2007She makes coffee in the morning, because she does not have time to stop along the way. She packs a lunch because some days she is hungry by 11, other days by noon. She keeps ibuprofen in her purse for anticipated headaches.
In the twilight, she sits on her front porch, imagining ways to save enough to buy the house she borrows from her landlord. As night falls, she tallies the list of ideas in her mind, plans their implementation.
She is going to sleep now, coins beneath her pillow that she hopes will turn to bills by morning.
100 Proof 